I have been under the weather and now that I'm moving about again I'm deleting photos to make room for more.
This one is nothing special, but I remember being so struck by how the bird blended into the landscape. Perfect matches. And I don't know enough about doves (is that what it is?) to know if the coloring is ordinary.

WASHINGTON (The Borowitz Report)—With its landmark decisions this week, the United States Supreme Court has sent the Republican Party scrambling to find entirely new bogus issues to pound away at during the 2016 campaign.

With gay marriage and Obamacare effectively taken off the table, the Republicans now find themselves without a signature phony issue to disingenuously flog for the next sixteen months.

But according to the Republican National Committee chairman, Reince Priebus, the Party is already conducting an exhaustive search to find “fresh new spurious positions” to shamelessly distract voters during the upcoming campaign.

Priebus acknowledged that the loss of Obamacare and gay marriage as issues had dealt a serious blow to the G.O.P.’s supply of meaningless talking points, but he claimed that the Party would come back with even more insincere rhetoric than before. “Anyone who thinks we’ve run out of b.s. is sorely mistaken,” he said.

DEKALB COUNTY, GEORGIA (The Borowitz Report)—The number of official candidates for the 2016 Republican Presidential nomination has risen to thirteen, according to officials at the Centers for Disease Control.

The count had stood at twelve since the announcement last week by the reality-show host Donald Trump, leading many at the C.D.C. to privately hope that the epidemic was losing steam. But with the entry of Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal into the race on Wednesday, the C.D.C. was forced to hold a press conference to announce the worrisome news that the number of candidates had increased yet again.

“It might have been misplaced optimism on our part, but we had started to believe that this thing had been contained,” said the C.D.C. spokesman Dr. Harland Dorrinson. “Regrettably, it has not.”

While scientists disagree about how running for President spreads from person to person, most epidemiologists believe that a candidacy needs an environment rich in narcissism and delusion—plus a host to feed on, ideally a sociopathic billionaire.

The C.D.C. spokesman refused to address speculation that Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker would soon enter the race, bringing the number of candidates to fourteen. “I don’t want to say anything that might cause the public to panic,” he said.
www.borowitzreport.com

MINNEAPOLIS (The Borowitz Report)—Many Americans are tired of explaining things to idiots, particularly when the things in question are so painfully obvious, a new poll indicates.

According to the poll, conducted by the University of Minnesota’s Opinion Research Institute, while millions have been vexed for some time by their failure to explain incredibly basic information to dolts, that frustration has now reached a breaking point.Of the many obvious things that people are sick and tired of trying to get through the skulls of stupid people, the fact that climate change will cause catastrophic habitat destruction and devastating extinctions tops the list, with a majority saying that they will no longer bother trying to explain this to cretins.

Coming in a close second, statistical proof that gun control has reduced gun deaths in countries around the world is something that a significant number of those polled have given up attempting to break down for morons.

Finally, a majority said that trying to make idiots understand why a flag that symbolizes bigotry and hatred has no business flying over a state capitol only makes the person attempting to explain this want to put his or her fist through a wall.

In a result that suggests a dismal future for the practice of explaining things to idiots, an overwhelming number of those polled said that they were considering abandoning such attempts altogether, with a broad majority agreeing with the statement, “This country is exhausting.”

Dennis Hastert Pleads Not Guilty to Lying About Hush Money
After days of silence, J. Dennis Hastert, a former speaker of the House of Representatives, on Tuesday pleaded not guilty to federal charges that he illegally structured bank withdrawals and lied to the authorities about millions of dollars he had promised to pay someone for misconduct that occurred decades ago.
It was the first time Mr. Hastert had appeared in public since the charges were announced last month, and he was met with a crush of news media in the federal courthouse here.
In late May, Mr. Hastert, 73, was indicted on charges of structuring cash withdrawals and lying to federal investigators in connection to what prosecutors described as an arrangement to pay a person, identified only as Individual A, a total of $3.5 million in exchange for not making public misconduct against that individual.